WAR- CHRONICLE

40
the canal was occupied by the enemy or not. We got there without
seeing any of the enemy about. I left my 3 men on the
bridge and crept over to the far side, about 100 yards without a
shot being fired. I then walked back to my men and said, we
could smoke a cigarette, the fellows had all gone off. But we had
hardly struck a match, when a shower of fire was begun for us
four. We threw ourselves on the ground and crept back where our
company was digging its nightly quarter, and heard there that one
of our buglers had got a shot through his head. That was the
result of the terrific firing. I met the man here in hospital, he is
in Berlin now. He was shot in the left eye, through his head,
and out at the right side of his neck. He was quite gay and had
no pain whatever.—We lay in our new trench till about 3 o'clock
in the afternoon, the hostile artillery firing on us all the time and the
English marines from the sea; but the latter shot mostly too far.
At 3 o'clock we got the order "Get ready to storm". As soon as
we set about climbing over our parapets, the infantry and machine
guns began to fire on us. It was like as if handfuls of peas had
been thrown over us, the bullets fell so near. We had often been
under such fire, that we thought nobody could get out unhurt; but
none of us had ever experienced anything like this. Now the
enemies' shells began to burst quite near us, as you can imagine
we presented an easy target. We went back to our trenches at
once. I got off safely, and now lay on the open field. About a
hundred yards in front of me, there was a heap of manure. At
the next volley of our artillery I ran to the manure-heap and lay
down behind it. Now I crept from heap to heap, and had just
reached the canal, when the bridge flew up in the air. They had
blown it up with contact-mines. Now we got the order to go into
the trenches. I had dug, a fairly large hole, and leaned back to
throw out the clay before _ me when I felt a pain, as if somebody
hit me with a big stick across the leg. At first 1 paid no attention,
and began to smoke my pipe so as to be as comfortable as possible.
It was only then I noticed that blood was oozing out of
my boot and it began to pain me, but I remained lying quietly
until it was dark; then two strong men took me by the arms and
brought me back, for the firing had left off somewhat. Then we
were taken to the bandaging station by the ambulance men. There
they cut off my boot and now I saw that 1 was shot through the
right leg, from the calf down to the ankle. But I think I can leave
here next week, a great many fellows have been sent away cured,
and none of us want to remain here any longer.
(Nordd. Allg. Zeitung, November 10, 1914.)
Life in the Trenches.
We take a copy of the extract of a letter from the "Biiein.-
Westtâl. Zeitung", which Herr Wulko, a reserve officer, who is a